Fantasy League Read Free Page A

getting to watch the one o’clock games in the East at ten on Sunday morning. It almost made Charlie feel as if he were seeing the games before anybody else did, like he was getting a jump on the whole country.
    The plan tonight was to watch the first half and then squeeze in burgers at halftime, Anna promising they wouldn’t miss a down. Her mom and dad would be watching the game, too.
    Anna and her parents went to all Bulldog home games, watching them from her grandfather’s private suite. Sometimes they’d even catch a road game, Anna either flying on a private jet with her grandpa, or on the team’s family plane.
    It was no great secret at Culver City Middle who Anna was, or that she came from a rich family. Very rich. Even for L.A. The Warren family, Charlie knew from his mom, had made about ten fortunes in Los Angeles real estate, going all the way back to Anna’s great-grandfather. But Anna and her family didn’t live rich, which was why she didn’t grow up in Beverly Hills, or Bel Air, or Malibu.
    Anna’s dad worked at Sony Studios, the same as Charlie’s mom, but in the public relations department. Charlie’s mom had always told him there were only two main groups of people in Los Angeles: Those who worked in the “industry,” which meant the movie industry. And those who knew somebody who worked in the industry.
    So Charlie and Anna both had parents working in the industry, but Charlie never thought of Anna that way; she came from the only business that interested him: the football business.
    â€œYou know why I like you so much?” Anna was saying to him as the two of them watched the pregame show.
    â€œBecause I make you look like you’re the genius in your own fantasy leagues?”
    â€œNo, it’s not that . . . and I don’t need
you
to make
me
look like a genius,” she said. “Though I have to say you do have a better brain for football than my uncle.”
    â€œI can hear you, you know?” Anna’s mom said from the next room.
    â€œIt’s true,” Anna called back to her.
    â€œRemember that you love your uncle and he loves you, too,” her mom said.
    Anna said to Charlie, “I’d love him a lot more if our team would win some games once in a while.”
    â€œStill hearing you!”
    Anna smiled at her mom, even though Molly Bretton couldn’t see her. “Having a private conversation here!”
    Anna had long dark hair and brown eyes, and though she wasn’t as tall as Charlie, she had long legs. There were about seven hundred girls at Culver Middle, but Charlie didn’t think one of them was prettier than Anna Bretton.
    Only she never acted as if she knew how pretty she was, the way she never made a big deal—any deal at all, really—about being a Warren. But she did love having a football team in the family. Even a bad one. And loved that team as fiercely as Charlie did. Maybe that was why they got along as well as they did. Anna had plenty of girlfriends at school, from her class, from her soccer team, from the tennis team. But she always seemed happier with Charlie and with guys who loved sports the way she did.
    â€œWhat was I saying before”—she raised her voice now—“
my mother rudely interrupted us
?”
    â€œYou were about to explain why you practically worship the ground I walk on,” Charlie said. “Or something along those lines.”
    â€œIn your dreams.”
    â€œAnd you might have thrown in something about my good looks, probably, and amazing sense of humor.”
    â€œAren’t you leaving out modesty?”
    â€œI’m much too modest to include that.”
    â€œAnyway,” Anna said, “the reason I like you is because you never treat me differently or like I’m some kind of freak just because my gramps owns the team.”
    â€œThat’s because you don’t act like one,” Charlie said,